Government releases experts' report on landfills

The Scott Wilson report on the rehabilitation of the Maghtab, Qortin and Wied Fulija landfills was published yesterday, just days after a Europe-wide tender worth €8.4 million was published on the EU official journal.

Environment Minister George Pullicino told a news conference that the tender was issued after EU structural funds had been secured for the project outlined in the final part of the report.

The tender would be awarded in September and works should be completed by the end of July 2007, Mr Pullicino said, adding that Malta would lose EU funds if that deadline is not met.

Work to rehabilitate the landfills, the report says, shall entail three main interventions.

Parts of the landfills, especially slopes that may subside, will be strengthened before any other remedy can be applied.

The waste mass needs to be reshaped and the slopes reduced especially at Wied Fulija where the waste risks falling into the sea.

A second intervention includes the installation of a system of steel wells to remove gases forming inside the landfills. These gases heat up causing fires that emit gases into the atmosphere. The project provides for the collection and reuse of such gases.

A third intervention will entail covering the landfill with compost, sludge and globigerina limestone before indigenous vegetation is planted and the site can start being used for recreation.

Sections of the landfill should be rehabilitated before others but it will take at least 20 years until a whole landfill area is completely rehabilitated.

Asked what has become of the government's plans to turn an area in Ta' l-Ghallis into an engineered landfill once waste fast reached the brim of Ta' Zwejra landfill, Mr Pullicino said the government was waiting for Mepa to give its go-ahead once the environment impact assessment is completed.

"A permit for Ta' l-Ghallis should be issued by May," Mr Pullicino said.

The government had come under fire for not releasing the Scott Wilson report earlier. But while presenting the report findings within the context of the national waste plan, WasteServ's strategy and development executive Chris Ciantar said the end of 2004 had been the target date stipulated for publishing the report commissioned in May 2002.

"The first step had been to stop dumping rubble in the landfills," Dr Ciantar said. After that, waste had stopped going to Maghtab and Qortin and started being dumped at the Ta' Zwejra engineered landfill where pipes to extract gases should soon be installed.

Barry Gore, a representative of Scott Wilson, explained that the consulting company had taken samples from the landfills by drilling down the waste mass to survey the heat inside.

He said surrounding soils and marine sediments were tested, together with the surrounding sea and ground water. "There was no significant contamination of ground water," Mr Gore said. However, traces of metals were found in the surrounding areas, particularly near Maghtab.

"Traces of ammonia in the sea near Maghtab was linked to pollution from cars and did not emanate from the landfill," Mr Gore added.

Scott Wilson tested the landfills for leachates, estimating how many contaminants from the landfills had seeped through the ground with the rainwater.

Mr Gore said there had been no leaching problems. However, he did say when fielding questions that tests for leachates were not carried out during the rainy season.

Though levels of dioxins in the surrounding areas were not alarming, the situation will worsen if not checked immediately, Mr Gore warned.

Martin Seychell, from the Malta Standards Authority, explained the health hazards posed by dioxins - a large group of organic compounds produced by uncontrolled landfill fires and which are highly persistent in the environment.

Mr Seychell, who also sits on the food safety commission within the Health Ministry, said dioxins have been used in the past as pesticides and herbicides but have been banned because of the health hazard they represent.

Known to cause severe reproductive and developmental problems apart from cancer, dioxins affect human beings because they accumulate in animals that graze on contaminated land.

The results by Scott Wilson show that the soils and marine sediments surrounding landfills contain traces of dioxins amounting to 6ng per kilo. This was more than the amount of dioxins found in Maltese soils elsewhere, which equalled less than 0.01ng per kilo, which Mr Seychell described as "negligible".

"The EU has a strict criteria of acceptable levels of dioxins in soils, setting a range of zero to 100ng per kilo," he said.

Up to 100,000ng per kilo of dioxins have been found in contaminated soil in other countries.

Present for the news conference were WasteServ chairman Nick de Giorgio and CEO Vince Magri.

A 200-page summary of the Scott Wilson report is available on the Environment Ministry's website, www.mrae.gov.mt A full version may be obtained on request from WasteServ. The public may ask questions and comment on the report via e-mail.